


Anything For a Friend

by tptigger



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, Inspired by Fanart, fluff with a touch of angst, post Season 1 finale, sock hop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-04
Updated: 2018-05-04
Packaged: 2019-05-01 22:12:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14530317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tptigger/pseuds/tptigger
Summary: Tilly has been talking about the Discovery sock hop for weeks and is now planning to sulk instead of go. Stamets isn't about to let that happen.





	Anything For a Friend

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Fan Art](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/378180) by Pumpkino. 



> Many thanks to Pumpkino for the awesome drawing that inspired this (in the related works). Also many thanks to 30minuteloop for the beta.

Stamets looked around the mess hall for a place to sit. This was always a little fraught as he inevitably still looked for someone in medical whites. Thankfully, this evening his eye was drawn, instead, to a shock of curly red hair. 

Tilly was eating with Detmer and Burnham. That would do.

Stamets stepped over to the table.

"Commander, can you please tell Ensign Tilly that she doesn't have to skip the sock hop like a brooding teenager just because she doesn't have a date?" Detmer asked as he approached.

"I'm not a brooding teenager," Tilly said.

Stamets set his tray down, taking Detmer's statement as an invitation to join them. "We're talking about the sock hop? _Which you haven't shut up about for a week_ , and you're letting a lack of a date stop you? You? Who stared down a rogue tardigrade on your first away mission, and..." He trailed off. No, wait, that wasn't the final time loop; she wouldn't remember that.

Tilly hid her face in her hands.

"What happened?" Stamets pulled out his chair and sat. 

Tilly just shook her head.

"He'll hear it from you, or he'll hear it from the scuttlebutt," Detmer pointed out.

Tilly uncovered her face and glared at Detmer. She turned to Stamets. "I marched right up to my crush and asked him to go with me and he laughed and now I'm just mortified and I'll spend the whole time hiding by the refreshment table and..."

"Tilly, breathe." Burnham set down her fork and squeezed Tilly's shoulder.

Stamets frowned. "He laughed at you?"

Tilly nodded.

"You want me to sneak you some _Psilocybe semilanceata_ to dose his food with?" Stamets asked.

Tilly stared.

Stamets just shrugged--if she didn't want revenge, that... was probably less paper work. "Still, you've been looking forward to this shindig since it was announced. Are you really going to skip it because one little thing didn't go your way?"

Tilly crossed her arms, leaning back in her chair. "I know me. I will be on the side lines--and looks who's talking. You've been outright refusing to go."

"Or leave your quarters other than for duty shifts or meals." Burnham serenely stabbed a bit of lettuce.

"Maybe, Commander, if you didn't try to wake me up at o-dark-thirty to go _running before breakfast_ of all things..." Stamets jabbed his finger towards Burnham.

"Still, you see." Tilly let her chair clatter back to all four legs. "Leave me alone! You're just as bad."

Stamets raised his eyebrow at her.

"Sir?" she added, lowering her head.

That was somehow worse; she looked so sad. Tilly couldn't be allowed to skip this. She'd mope for weeks and nothing would get done around the lab. (Plus Tilly would be moping. He didn't want Tilly to mope.)

"What if I teach you how to do the Boogie Woogie and the Bop?" Stamets wheedled.

If she knew the dances, she wouldn't be so shy, right?

Tilly's jaw dropped. "What? And that's not really going to..."

"I will drag you out on the dance floor myself," Stamets blurted. 

And just like that, he realized what he was volunteering for. Shit. Counselor Burgis would punch the air if she were in earshot; she'd been pestering him to go.

If he was teaching Tilly how to dance he couldn't miss Hugh, right?

"You don't have to.... I mean you just lost... I mean...."

Stamets rubbed the back of his neck. "Burgis thinks I should go. I can't do it for me, but... I could go for a friend. I'm not talking about a date, Tilly."

Tilly blushed. "I know, it's just... you don't have to."

"I want to." He paused, realizing even as the words came out of his mouth that he actually meant it. "Send me the replicator pattern for what you're wearing, though."

"What? Why?" Tilly asked.

Stamets just grinned at her. "Just because we're going as friends doesn't mean I'm doing a half assed job of it."

The intercom crackled. "Commander Stamets and Commander Burnham report to the bridge."

"I'll bus your trays," Tilly said.

Detmer stood as well, following them to the turbolift.

"Keyla, why are you..." Burnham started.

"Lt. Detmer report to the bridge."

Detmer pointed at the intercom and winked.

Burnham rolled her eyes.

Stamets had an awful thought. "Burnham, you'd have said something if taking Tilly to the sock hop platonically violated any fraternization regs, right?"

"My apologies, Lt. Commander, but you're stuck." Burnham boarded the turbolift.

As long as he wasn't in trouble, he was actually ok with that.

"No apologies necessary, Commander."

* * *

The next evening, Tilly stood outside the mess hall doors, hoping she wasn't making a mistake. She knew she looked good. Her white shirt was adorned with a black "T" on the breast for "Tilly" and a pink poodle skirt.

"Tilly," Owosekun said as she and Richter approached the mess hall. "You look great! I'm glad you changed your mind about coming stag."

"I... I'm meeting Commander Stamets?" Tilly said.

Owosekun raised an eyebrow.

"As a friend; like a friend thing?" Tilly scuffed her saddle shoes on the deck.

Stamets came around the corner of the corridor. He was wearing a pink suit cut in the 1950s style, with black trim and a black bow tie.

Tilly's mouth dropped open. "O dang."

Stamets flushed. "Thank you." He drew up beside her, offering her an arm. "I believe I promised to teach you the boogie woogie?"

Tilly took his arm, smiling widely. "You did."

End


End file.
